The

Outlook

An Illustrated Weekly Journal of Current Life

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 1921

PRICE: FIFTEEN CENTS’ A COPY
FIVE DOLLARS A YEAR

381 FOURTH AVENUE, NEW YORK

THE NATION’S MEAT BILL

BY SHERMAN ROGERS

THE LINCOLN THEY SAW

l-A BOY AT LINCOLJN’S FEET

A REMINISCENCE OF A LINCOLN-DOUCLAS DEBATE

BY GARRETT NEWKIRK

“1 have come upon an engraving of
President Lincoln, in profile," wrote
Professor S. H. Woodbridge, of
Washington, to us recently, ‘‘which
for strength and maturity surpasses
anything 1 have seen of him in por-
trait print. With it is an autograph
written for and given by him to a
gentleman of Washington, the father
of one of my local associates." It
is a reproduction of this engraving
which wc print herewith. For pur-
poses of comparison we have placed
above, beside it, another portrait also
in profile, very similar in general
appearance. What is striking about
what we may call the Woodbridge
portrait of Lincoln is the expression,
which, unlike that of most portraits
of him, shows him at a time when
care has been relieved by bis sense
of humor

There was great excitement in
Stark County, Illinois, upon a day
early in the autumn of 1858. Mr.
Lincoln was to speak at Toulon,’ the
county seat, and I, a lad of eleven years,
was to ride sixteen miles with my
father in the hand-wagon to see and
hear the man I had heard so much
about. It was during the period of the
seven joint debates between Lincoln
and Douglas, candidates for the United
States Senate, that were being held in
different parts of the State about once
a week. In the intervening days they
spoke separately at other places, as a
rule following one another on alternate
days. If Lincoln came, as I remember,
on Tuesday, Douglas arrived on Wed-
nesday, and spoke from the same plat-
form. All tlje Republicans and many
Democrats went to hear Lincoln; all
the Democrats and many Republicans
attended the Douglas meetings. Some
there were, of course, unafflliated with
either party, who wished to hear both
candidates before making their choice.

On the morning of this day you may
be sure our chores on the farm were
done and breakfast eaten before day-

^ Sovt^ral gazetteers consulted show but two
'roulons in the world, one in France and this in
Illinois.'

216

break. The sun was hardly risen when
we had driven to the crossroad village
of Bradford and stalled our horses in
Uncle Zach’s barn. The band-wagon
soon came along and took us in. It
was an ordinary farm wagon with a
seating rack above the wheels and steps
leading up in the rear. There was a
high seat for the driver and the horses
numbered four. The band consisted of
five pieces — two fifes, one bass and two
tenor drums. The distinctive uniform
of my father, one of the fifers, was a
faded brown coat and a “palm-leaf”
hat with the brim religiously trained to
turn up behind and down in front. As a
subscriber to the New York “Tribune,”
his beard was trimmed in Horace Gree-
ley style. His experience with the fife
dated back to the days of his youth, in
the old “General Trainin’s” of the Em-
pire State.

The second fifer on the wagon was Dal-
rymple (“Uncle Dal”), likewise a prairie

farmer; a tall, straight Virginian, with
iron-gray beard that reached to his
waist and a wide-rimmed hat of black.
He played with enthusiasm, keeping
time vigorously with his heel. His in-
strument my father despised because it
had a mouthpiece that gave forth a high
metallic screech. Father insisted that a
fife should be melodious, played like a
flute, with no “tube” attachment.

Curtiss, the blacksmith, could make
the bass drum roar to be heard a mile,
and his timing was exact.

But the star performer of our band
was Pettingill, the harnessmaker, a
little man from Maine. My greatest
wish for years was that I might play
the little drum as he did. It seems to
me yet that I have never seen another
who could make the “r-r-r-roll” so per-
fect with a pair of sticks.

Little “Mollie Stark” County was then
untouched by a railway, and all who
went to Toulon that day from twenty

TH.E OUTLOOK

217

miles around rode in buggies, wagons,
or on horseback. As we went on, the
delegations from our section fell in be-
hind the band in long procession on the
dusty road. Stirring music announced
our coming to every village and “Cor-
ners.”

Spoon River had no “Anthology” at
that time, and very few bridges. We
forded the stream at Fuller’s Mill,
barely wetting the horses’ feet. Passing
through Jersey Township, we arrived
at the fair grounds just north of Toulon
about eleven o’clock. Here the clans
were gathering, according to arrange-
ment, to greet Mr. Lincoln on his ar-
rival from Cambridge, where he had
spoken the day before. Soon the en-
tire race-track was bordered by the
crowd, in all manner of conveyances.
Our driver secured a position close to
the “inside” track and near the en-
trance. We had .a half-hour of waiting,
enlivened by the playing of several
bands in turn.

The reader would hardly guess in
what manner Mr. Lincoln came in
through the high-posted gateway.

A young man in the neighborhood
had trained a pair of two-year-old steers
to drive in harness. These were at-
tached to a low barouche, the top of
which, turned back, reached nearly to
the ground. In this vehicle, towering
high with his “plug” hat, sat the future
President, beside him the little driver
under a wide-brimmed “slouch.”

Then the cheering began, and at first
Mr. Lincoln tried to rise from his seat
in acknowledgment; but he could not
rise far in the moving carriage without
losing his equilibrium. Just as his long
form got bent to about the shape of a
letter S he would suddenly sink back
with an impact no doubt that was hardly
pleasant. The entire combination was
so ludicrous that the crowd went wild.
Mr. Lincoln laughed with them, and
decided to keep his seat, raising his hat
and bowing while he made the circuit
of the half-mile track. The cheering
was a fore-wave of that to be heard
within two years in that famous wig-
wam by the lake.

Then, passing into the road, the
unique equipage led the procession up-
town with our band in the lead, each
player doing his best.

Having dinner with a friend of my
father’s made us late at the meeting.
The platform from which Mr. Lincoln
spoke was at the south side of the
Court-House, where there was a wide,
open square. Opposite, on the north,
was another stand for an overflow meet-

STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS, THE ‘^LITTLE GIANT”

ing, which was addressed, according to
my remembrance, by Frank P. Blair.

I was sorely disappointed that we
were on the outskirts of a great crowd,
with Mr. Lincoln speaking. My father,
being quite deaf, had not expected to
hear much of the speech, and was quite
content with his situation. I straight-
way asked if I might get nearer if I
could. I shall ever be grateful for his
answer: “Go ahead; come back here
when it’s over.”

Being slender and persistent, I some-
how wormed my way through that
human mass till I stood directly at Mr.
Lincoln’s feet, near the edge of«the plat-
form. I am sure I could have touched
his boots.

There, with hat in hand, I stood
nearly an hour, looking up and listen-
ing. I understood much of what he was'
saying, for I had read the newspapers

and heard the issues discussed at home.
But it was the form, the action, and
presence of the man that impressed
me chiefly; his towering height, his
straightness when he stood erect, his
long arms, now swinging, now e.xtend-
ing forth; his limbs that seemed to
bend like a huge jack-knife, bringing his
head forward at times toward his audi-
ence, till it seemed to me he was in
danger of falling. I had the feeling
that he was the most dead-in-earnest
man I had ever heard speak, that he
meant every word and knew just what
he was talking about; that he was so
honest he would never think of trying
to deceive anybody. In a word, he in-
spired my full confidence, that never
wavered from that moment, no matter
what any one might say. I have at
•least one distinct memory incident to
this address. Standing near Mr. Lin-
coln as I did, hatless, with upturned
face, I was conscious now and then of
falling mist upon my brow. This, we
know, any speaker will emit addressing
an outdoor audience with intent to be
heard by the farthest listener. I had
to keep my red bandanna handkerchief
in hand for use whenever he leaned
directly toward me; and yet I had no
thought of changing my position till
the last word was said.

In later years the unpleasant memory
was relieved by a thought suggested — •
that I had been baptized that day, in-
deed, into the faith of him who spoke,
“the faith that right makes might,” as
he had said, and that the speech I
heard was being repeated with ever-
increasing influence throughout the
world.

I have no further memory of the day
except that fife and drum were little
heard upon the homeward way, that I
was very sleepy, and dozed at times in
the rough-going wagon with my head
on father’s knee. No remembrance
comes of that late supper, prepared, I
know, with the appetizing art that only
a mother knows.

Twenty months later came that great-
est of all conventions, in Chicago. My
father, born and raised in New York
State, wished earnestly for Seward’s
nomination, while I, in secret, hoped
for that of Lincoln, and when it came
my joy was unrestrained.

II-HONEST ABE AND THE LITTLE GIANT

A REMINISCENCE OF LINCOLN’S FIRST INAUGURATION '

BY THE LATE DR. G. B. WALLIS ' ^

A CONTEMPORARY NEWSPAPER CORRESPONDENT AT THE CAPITAL

The 4th of March, 1861, was a
crisis of life or death to the incom-
ing President, Abraham Lincoln,
then in his fifty-first year. South Caro-
lina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Missis-
sippi, Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas, Ten-
nessee, North Carolina, and Virginia,
withdrawn from the United States at
Montgomery, Alabama, had formed an
independent government, “on the corner-
stone of Negro slavery.” Jefferson Davis

had been inaugurated President of
“these so-called Confederate States.
They had seized the custom-houses, post
offices, mints, most of the forts, arsenals,
and other property of the United States
within their borders, and while waiting
for negotiations “to go in peace” they
were arming for war.

Governor Hicks, of Maryland, had dis-
covered a Confederate plot within her
borders for the seizure of Washington

City on Lincoln’s inauguration day. Of
this plot the veteran Winfield Scott, Gen-
eral-in-Chief of the United States Army,
had been informed. Rumors were afloat
of a projected co-operating rebel raid
from Virginia with that from Maryland.

The resident population of Washing-
ton, almost wholly Southern and a slat e-
holding community, were strongly in
sympathy with the cause of the Confed-
eracy, and a rebel rising in the city was

218

THR OUTLOOK

U h'ebnmry

LINCOLN’S INAUGUEATION BALL AS PICTURED IN “FRANK LESLIE’S ILLUSTRATED NEWSPAPER” AT THE TIME

feared with the incoming of the appre-
hended raids. Treason was in the air.
The assassination of the new President,
the seizure of the United States Treas-
ury, and the overthrow of the Govern-
ment were threatened; and to guard
against a possible incursion for these
objects by a descent of thousands of
desperate men General Scott had only a
few hundred regular troops and marines
at hand.

For the protection of the President-
elect in the usual procession to the
Capitol and at the Capitol and for the
safety of the Treasury these troops were
judiciously distributed in detachments.
From the carriage-way to the door at
the north end of the Capitol by which
the incoming President entered he was
protected by a covered way, a rough
shed of boards for the day’s service.
From point to point on the housetops
from the Treasury to the Capitol senti-
nels were placed, lookouts to give warn-
ing of the approach of an invasion of
the enemy. For the immediate protec-
tion of the President in the procession,
his carriage 'Was surrounded by a com-
pact squad of cavalry, formed in an in-
closing hollow square.

A gloomy, ominous, and alarming in-
augural procession it was, but it was
not without its redeeming features. The
pageant and day passed off quietly, as
quietly as a funeral. To the most timid
of peace-loving Quakers the presence
of the outgoing, side by side in the

open barouche, with the incoming Presi-
dent dispelled all fears of a day of war.
Under the circumstances, this ride of
Buchanan with Lincoln was a coura-
geous act of ofHcial courtesy. It was the
exception to what the custom had been
in such cases, and, being unexpected, it
attracted the special notice and admi-
ration of friends and foes.

Lincoln’’s inauguration ball, 1861, was
not grand, but was gloomy and peculiar.
It was given in a commodious and
breezy shanty of pine boards and scant-
ling, built for the purpose. It was an
extraordinary occasion, and the pavilion
was adapted to the accommodation of
the extraordinary assemblage expected.
And it was an extraordinary assemblage,
though not in the thousands of patriotic
Republicans looked for by the over-
sanguine company financially concerned.
It was a thin house. There were hardly
a thousand persons on the floor when
the music from the band, “Hail to the
Chief,” was played as President Lincoln
entered the ballroom. The gathering was
extraordinary, however, in its prevail-
ing elements. They told a story of dis-
possession and occupation of the Gov-
ernment, strange and portentous, the
dispossession of the South and the
forces of King Cotton, and an occupa-
tion by the “outside barbarians” of the
Northwest. Oh, the fearful change!
There was nothing like this in the in-
auguration ball of any President from
the beginning to this day.

Federalist or Republican, Democrat or
Whig, Jackson or Harrison, Polk or Tay-
lor, Pierce or Buchanan, the inaugura-
tion ball was still essentially the same.
King Cotton, the chivalry, and the brill-
iant and fascinating beauties of the
South still gave tone, grouping, coloring,
and expression to the picture. “But
what have we here?” asks the gentleman
from South Carolina. “What is this as-
semblage which Lincoln is passing undpr
review? Strange figures, costumes, and
faces from ‘Down East,’ from the Cana-
dian border, from the prairies, from the
log cabins of Minnesota, from the woods
of Oregon and the mining camps of
California. And the dominant type mas-
culine is that of the long and lathy aboli-
tionist, a philanthropist of the ‘Praise
God Barebones’ family ; while overshadow-
ing the queens of the gathering here are
the strong-minded, tough, muscular belles
of the Women’s Rights Associations.

“The South in this fete, save here and
there a vigilant observer (a spy, if you
please), is not represented. The women
of the South — the life, the charm, here-
tofore of these Presidential triumphs —
are missing, gone with the seceding
States, and this affair is a dance with-
out a partner, a festival to which the
invited guests have not come, and whose
places are filled by strangers from the
wayside.”

The gentleman from South ’Carolina
is a little wild in his photograph, but,
though distorted and overdone, it is a

1923

THE OUTLOOK

219

photograph that he has given of the
assemblage, 1861, at Lincoln’s inaugura-
tion ball. To a dispassionate observer,
with his recollections of balls to Polk,
Taylor, and other Presidents, it was,
from the absence of any representation
from the seceded Southern States, not
only a strangely cold, timid, and un-
sociable affair. It was sad, gloomy, and
disheartening. It was under a cloud
through which no star vras visible. It
was only when Lincoln, arm in arm
with the beautiful wife of Senator Doug-
las, followed by the “Little Giant” with
the short, plump, and happy Mrs. Lin-
coln on his arm, walked around the ball-
room that the chill of the house was
broken. A general current of conversa-
tion followed. “Are they not well
matched — Lincoln and Mrs. Douglas,
both tall, and Douglas and Mrs. Lincoln,
both short and dumpy?” “Yes, only look
— Douglas is a head shorter than his
wife, and Mrs. Lincoln could walk under
her husband’s arm.”

Mrs. Douglas was a Miss Catts, of
Virginia, a grand-niece of President
Madison; and Mrs. Lincoln was a Miss
Todd, of Kentucky, also of the Madison
family. Lincoln and Douglas had been
rival beaux of Mary Todd, and later on
both were running for President at the
same time, and both were from Illinois.
Man and wife on both sides had been
fighting the other two, and now all of
them were here together. Let us look

at the two men. A stranger would have
taken Douglas for the man elected, he
looked so cheerfully about, and Lincoln
one would take for the defeated candi-
date, as he appeared so sad and miser-
able. And it was so. Douglas appar-
ently was satisfied, as a man relieved
of a heavy burden by an old friend. He
knew, with the division of his party at
Charleston on the slavery issue, between
himself and Breckinridge, that the Re-
publican candidate would walk into the
Presidency between them. He knew
with the nomination of Lincoln that he
would be elected. The election was no
disappointment to Douglas; nor was his
fight so much against Lincoln as against
the Southern fire-eaters. They had de-
feated him, but he had finished them.
They were done for, or would be in the
Southern Confederacy. He knew that
Lincoin would have to fight this Con-
federacy, fire and sword, by land and
sea; and the presence of Douglas at this
ball was a proclamation to the South
that in this fight he would be with Lin-
coln. The Senator’s mind was made up.
The door of compromise was closed. His
course was open before him. No more
doubts or misgivings. Hence his ready
wit and honest laugh in his exchange
of little flatteries with admiring friends.
He had lost the Presidency, but he had
regained his freedom, and he was here
to proclaim it.

But why this sad, dreamy, and far-

away look in the melanchoiy eyes of
Lincoln, with all these welcoming faces
around him, and with the beautiful,
chatty, and charming Mrs. Douglas on
his arm? He has his joke, but it does
not change the sad expression in his
eyes. Is it the shadow of the assassin
still upon his track? Something, per-
haps, of this. They tell us it is partiy
a transmission from father to son, partly
an imprint from his early life with its
hardships in the woods and in the Missis-
sippi flatboat, but deepened since No-
vember from his broodings over the
dreadful visions before him in his heavy
task of duty, in which he may fail or
fall by the way. There is no sign of
fear in those sad eyes.

It is an exceptionally tall, long-limbed,
shambling, and ungainly figure, this of
Lincoln; nor is there a model of beauty
or dignity in his little head with its
projecting eyebrows, big nose, thin face,
and unshapely mouth, pleading the cause
of a penniless client or the faith and
mission of the Republican party.

Approved as the statesman and patriot
for the crisis, he is here. And in his
gentle voice and kindly disposition,
above all, in the sympathy for the suf-
fering and the sorrowful, expressed in
those sad eyes, we have the key to the
character of this rough diamond, this
man who in his relations with his fel-
low-men, peace or war, had “malice for
none, and charity for all.”

OUR CITY OF THE SEVEN HILLS

BY E. H. CHRISTY THOMAS

The kindly spirit of the early
Quakers still broods over Phila-
delphia. Boston still displays evi-
dences of its Puritan beginnings. It is
more difficult to recognize anything of
early Dutch phlegm in New York, but
of course New York is New York. There
is still something of the glamour of ’49
around the Golden Gate, and the gay
character of old Creole days in New
Orleans has not been entirely pushed
aside by the modern city.

But Seattle probably retains its early
traits with more tenacity than any
other American city of importance.
Most conspicuous among these traits is
the city’s insistence upon law and order.
There is nothing academic about this
ancient phrase out in Seattle. Even
under pressure of the rush of the hardiest
of adventurers for the Klondike, when
Seattle was the outfitting station and
the jumping-off place for Alaska, the
sheriffs of King County and the police
of Seattle preserved the peace as it has
seldom, if ever, been preserved in other
communities in critical times.

Only an extraordinary civic vitality
could have taken Seattle’s population,
compounded of migrants from our East-
ern States, exotic streams from the
Orient, and miners and woodsmen from
the North, and welded them and their
dreams into a successful city.

Seattle has always been proud of her

A SEATTLE SIvT-SCRAPER

ability to take care of herself. Seattle
boils when she hears it said that “revo-
lution” ever threatened her pursuit of
happiness. In fact, Seattle’s so/called
general strike lasted less than forty-
eight hours, and proved a joke. There
wasn’t even a fist fight. Why? Seattle’s
traditions for law and order and the
protection of every citizen, white, black,
or yellow, are held inviolate, and have
been since its earliest days.

Seattle pioneers who have given their
time and money to building the city be-
come indignant when a visitor refers to
this now-famous episode. No city any-
where, at any time, in their opinion, has
been so maliciously slandered, libeled,
misjudged, and misrepresented as has
Seattle because of the notoriety growing
out of the strike. Seattle business men,
city officials, police, the Federal authori-
ties, army and navy officers stationed
there, newspapermen, and labor leaders
are united in that belief. They agree
that the things which are supposed to
have happened during the strike not
only did not occur at all, but that the
city is, was, and always has been in-
capable of them, and they cite history to
prove it.

Seattle was founded in 1851 by a little
band of pioneers from Illinois. In o.x-
teams and prairie schooners they trav-
ersed the plains between the Missouri
River and the Willamette Valley in Ore-